"Hardwood"
(in the Chiracahua Apache language)

"You
must speak straight so that your words may go as sunlight into our
hearts.
Speak Americans.. I will not lie to you; do not lie to me."

Cochise
was a tall man, six feet, with broad shoulders and a commanding
appearance. He never met a man his equal with a lance, and, like Crazy
Horse, was never photographed. They both were buried in secret
locations on their homeland.

Quotes
from Cochise

"When I
was young I walked all over this country, east and west, and saw no
other people than the Apaches. After many summers I walked again and
found another race of people had come to take it. How is it?

We were
once a large people covering these mountains. We lived well: we were at
peace. One day my best friend was seized by an officer of the white men
and treacherously killed. At last your soldiers did me a very great
wrong, and I and my people went to war with them.

The
worst place of all is Apache Pass. There my brother and nephews were
murdered. Their bodies were hung up and kept there till they were
skeletons. Now Americans and Mexicans kill an Apache on sight. I have
retaliated with all my might.

My
people have killed Americans and Mexicans and taken their property.
Their losses have been greater than mine. I have killed ten white men
for every Indian slain, but I know that the whites are many and the
Indians are few. Apaches are growing less every day.

Why is
it that the Apaches wait to die -- That they carry their lives on their
fingernails? They roam over the hills and plains and want the heavens
to fall on them. The Apaches were once a great nation; they are now but
few, and because of this they want to die and so carry their lives on
their fingernails.

I am
alone in the world. I want to live in these mountains; I do not want to
go to Tularosa. That is a long way off. I have drunk of the waters of
the Dragoon Mountains and they have cooled me: I do not want to leave
here.

Nobody
wants peace more than I do. Why shut me up on a reservation? We will
make peace; we will keep it faithfully. But let us go around free as
Americans do. Let us go wherever we please."